Efforts are being made to reduce the size and packaging of atomic sensors, including atomic clocks and other sensors which utilize cold atom clouds as the sensing element. To accomplish this, efforts are focusing on reducing the size of the physics package for the atomic sensor. One example of a physics package is a glass block that is machined and sealed to maintain an ultra-high vacuum. In certain configurations, the glass block includes a plurality of faces on its exterior and a plurality of angled borings that serve as light paths to trap, cool, and manipulate the cold atomic sample. Mirrors and windows are fixedly attached over the exterior openings of the light path bores to seal the physics package. A cavity evacuation structure (e.g., vacuum pumping port) is attached to provide means for initial vacuum evacuation of the physics package. A sample reservoir (e.g., a reservoir for alkali material) is attached to supply the atoms that will be used in the sensor. The sample reservoir is broken or otherwise activated after vacuum processing, releasing a background vapor. Atoms in the background vapor are cooled by the optical beams and trapped by magnetic fields in a configuration commonly called a magneto optical trap (MOT) or without the magnetic field, an optical molasses. When cooling atoms from a background vapor, the number of atoms collected into the MOT scales as the fourth power of the optical beam size used in the physics package. In the fundamental limit, the signal to noise of atomic sensors scale as the square root of the trapped atoms, lending a fundamental scaling on the sensor signal to noise and optical beam size. Developing a small volume physics package which allows for large optical beams and added-flexibility of a multi-beam configuration is critical to the development of high performance miniature atomic physics packages. Using multiple beam MOT configuration allow flexibility that a single beam configuration, such as a pyramid trap, does not allow. This flexibility is necessary, for example, to consider atomic sensor or clocks which require optical pumping for precision state preparation, optical pulses for coherent atomic manipulation or atomic “beam splitters”, or for reduction of optical scatter via the selective shuttering of optical beams.